I'm managing director of Strategic Communications for FTI Consulting, based in Houston. Prior to joining FTI in 2012, I had a 33 year career in the oil and gas industry, working public policy issues for a number of companies including Shell, Burlington Resources, El Paso Corp., and Coastal States. I've also led numerous industry-wide efforts to address regulatory and legislative issues at the local, state and federal level. From April 2010 through June 2012, David served as the Texas State Lead for America’s Natural Gas Alliance. I attended Texas A&I University and The University of Texas, earning B.A. in accounting.

Keystone XL Protest - An Exercise In Hypocrisy And Ignorance

On Sunday, somewhere around 1,000 anti-Keystone XL pipeline protesters staged a demonstration outside the White House grounds in Washington, DC. Thanks to my colleage, Katie Brown, we have the following photos of the demonstration to share with you.

The protesters came from far and wide to the nation’s capital. They traversed the land via trains, planes and automobiles, the vast majority of which were powered by – gasp! – gasoline, jet fuel and other petroleum products. It seems that, like Al Gore, Bill McKibben and other heroes of the anti-fossil fuel movement who have no qualm traveling the globe in petroleum-powered private jets and limousines, the protesters’ desire for human beings to freeze in the dark does not apply to themselves. Go figure.

In the photo above, you see the KeystoneXL pipeline characterized as a “pipeline to hell”. Given that completion of the line would add a little over 800 miles of subsoil pipe to the several hundred thousand mile network of pipeline that already criss-crosses our country, one can only wonder why we haven’t, as a people, arrived at the devil’s doorstep already!

This fine example of American youth equates “climate change” to “class war”, a slogan that one of the demonstration’s organizers no doubt told him was incredibly clever. Given that no fewer than five – count ‘em, five! – environmental impact studies conducted by the current administration related to the Keystone XL project have found that it would have no significant climate change-related impacts, we are guessing this fellow either doesn’t read much or simply wandered into the wrong protest by mistake.

Good to see the EcoSocialist contingent proudly displaying its signage at the rally, given that “ecosocialism” has long been the real goal behind the anti-energy movement all over the world. At long last, someone with a little intellectual honesty here.

The “Michigan Punx” were there with a sign cleverly worded in pig latin, which we were afraid had become a lost art. What a relief!

At one point, many of these misguided youths chained themselves to the fence that borders the White House lawn, knowing they would be arrested, and 398 of them were. They and their companions then took to various social media outlets, on which they expressed shock and outrage that they were being taken in by the police. We would be remiss if we failed to point out that the zipties the protesters used to attach themselves to the fence, and thus ensure their eventual arrest, were made from plastic, which of course is in turn made from – gasp! – petroleum products.

In an effort to turn up the day’s drama and attract more eager TV cameras and reporters, those not chaining themselves to the fence with plastic zipties resorted to staging what they called a “human oil slick”. Note that the ground cover they used appears to be made from the sort of black heavy material that large garbage bags are made from. In other words – plastic.

Oops.

Of course, the TV reporters and cameras largely ignored Sunday’s protest, choosing instead to focus the preponderance of their attention on the real news of the day, i.e., the Russian Federation’s invasion of Ukraine, an event that itself is largely driven by energy-related considerations. The growing instability in that and other parts of the world, like Venezuela and the Middle East, only serve to make energy security, which the Keystone XL pipeline would enhance, an increasingly vital concern for the United States.

The protest on Sunday was, by the protesters’ own admission, not just a protest against Keystone XL, but against all forms of fossil fuels. This is a position that lies far outside the mainstream of American thought, not to mention a practical impossibility. Even President Obama consistently says we need an “all of the above” approach to energy in our country.

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